Elijah confronted Ahab that second time, after Elijah
had raised the boy from the dead and
spent those wonderful months and months with the
widow, the foreigner.
He came back and as he confronted Ahab,
Ahab said, you're the troubler of Israel.
And Elijah said, I am not the troubler
of Israel.
This is what he said to Ahab.
I have not troubled Israel, but you have
and your father's house, in that you have
forsaken the commandments of the Lord and have
followed the Baals.
You know, it's the confrontation of the ages.
People that have the word of God, people
that know the word of God, they turn
away from the word of God, they forsake
the word of God, they forsake God, mixture
comes in and they start to worship something
else.
Whether it's Baal in those days, today it's
something that will creep in.
Maybe it's a person, maybe it's something that
takes more importance in your life than knowing
Yeshua and becoming more Christlike.
The suffering and the slow build of character
that Elijah went through at the brook, waiting
for the bird and in Seraphat with the
widow and with the young boy, he was
becoming more and more Christlike.
But this man, the king, who should have
been the leader of the religion of northern
Israel, he had brought in all of this
mixture and he was the troubler of Israel.
When a government like Ahab's or any other
western government starts to endorse homosexuality, there were
homosexual practices all over the high places of
Israel.
There was child sacrifice on the high places
of Israel, including Mount Carmel, here where we
are.
Elijah took a stand against that and said,
I'm not the troubler of Israel, you're the
troubler of Israel.
Now bring all your prophets, all the prophets
of Baal, all those that eat at Jezebel's
table, taking the money from the people and
living in prosperity and luxury, bring them all
up there.
And bring them to the top of the
mountain and let's have a showdown between the
God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, Adonai, and
your false idol that you worship, Baal.
So, messengers must have gone out to all
the different tribes in northern Israel saying, come
to Mount Carmel, there's going to be a
showdown, the prophet Elijah is going to be
there, there's going to be a showdown and
we're going to bring all the prophets, all
the prophets of Baal, they will be there,
and the priests, and everyone started to come.
It must have been, oh, this is going
to be exciting, what a show this will
be up on the top of Mount Carmel,
how fabulous this will be.
And so here they come, the tribal leaders
coming across Galilee, coming from up Mount Carmel,
coming across from over on Mount Carmel, Hermon,
and there they came, the grandfathers, maybe they
were walking with the little children and the
mothers, and all the army came, and the
keepers of the peace, the police force we
might say in our day, they came, and
here they all came, all in their regalia,
all the soldiers in their armor with their
shields and their spears, and then here came
King Ahab, riding up in his chariot, the
king, the leader that everybody looked to and
bowed down to, this man that had brought
all of this mixture and compromise and evil
into Israel, the chosen people of God that
were supposed to have a relationship with God
and be a light to the nations.
And finally they all came, and then maybe
there was a pause, they were wondering, will
he come, will Elijah come, is he coming,
anybody seen him?
And then he appeared, maybe up on a
ridge above them and walked down, they opened
up, walked through, imagine this man wearing this
beat up old prophet's cloak, looking at all
these wild priests wearing all this stuff that
they wore and banging all the crazy instruments
they used and he walked through and he
looked at his own people, he looked at
the people of Israel and says, why do
you falter between two opinions, why are you
limping between two opinions, at least, if Baal
is Baal, worship him, if Jehovah is God,
worship him, no one answered him a word,
finally he said, alright, Ahab, I'll tell you
what, the God who answers by fire, he
is God.
Elijah must have heard this from the Lord,
he said, let the prophets here, get two
animals, cut up the animal, you give your
sacrifice, and the God who answers by fire,
he is God, how does that sound, and
all the people said, it's good, it is
good, it is good, this is good, this
is a good challenge, this is a good
confrontation.
Imagine, the 450 prophets of Baal, put an
altar together, they made their own altar, brothers
and sisters, don't make your own altar, you
can only worship at God's altar, they made
their own altar, we'll worship this way, they
cut up an animal, they put it on
there, there were the pieces of the animal,
so they started crying out to Baal, all
their chanting, it's like new age mantras were
going up on all the high places of
Israel.
Crying out to Baal, going on and on
and on, they jumped up and down, they
got on top of the altar, they were
shouting, they were screaming, they were banging all
these weird instruments, they even cut themselves with
knives, and there was no answer, they would
wait, and there was silence, and the people
who had been steeped in all of this
superstition, all of this demonic stuff, that Jezebel
and Ahab had brought into Israel, they were
watching, and nothing happened, finally, it was almost
3 o'clock in the afternoon, Elijah came,
and Elijah said, come near to me, and
he restored the altar of the Lord, the
altar of Jehovah on Mount Carmel, it had
been torn down, there had been an altar
there, where pure sacrifice had been done, maybe
Joshua's people came in at some point, we
don't know, but there had been an altar,
he restored it, the 12 stones, and when
he took the 12 stones, which represented the
sons of Jacob, he says, and the 12
tribes of Israel, he was saying, the tribes
are going to come back, it was a
prophetic act, because the two southern tribes, Judah
and Benjamin were separated from the northern tribes,
so he was saying, there's going to be
unity, the 12 tribes will be back, and
we see this on Mount Carmel, as a
prophetic picture for our day, the 12 tribes
are back, the fire is going to fall
on them, hallelujah, he put the 12 stones,
he put wood on there, branches of trees,
I guess, they cut up an animal, they
put bloody animal pieces on there, he had
them take water from a brook, a spring,
they poured it on there, with 4 pitchers,
they did it 3 times, 12 times, water
was all over it, he dug a trench
around it, and then he prayed a simple,
simple prayer, let me read it to you,
this is what he said, Lord God of
Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, he said, Israel, not
Jacob, let it be known this day, that
you are God in Israel, and I am
your servant, and that I have done all
these things at your word, hear me, O
Lord, hear me, that this people may know,
that you are the Lord God, and that
you have turned their hearts back to you
again, this simple prayer, his courage came from,
I have done all of these things, you
told me exactly what to do, now I
have done it, I know you are going
to answer, you told me the God who
answers by fire, you are going to answer
by fire, he prayed this simple prayer, there
must have been a holy hush all over
that mountain, and then all of a sudden,
the heavens were torn open, the people must
have looked up, and there from above came
this fireball, this supernatural fireball of the presence
of God coming from heaven, came down and
hit that altar, hit that animal, the animal
burst in flames, the people must have screamed,
the wood burned up, the water burned up,
the stones burned up, everything was burned up,
there was nothing left but ashes, and all
of a sudden, the people, one by one,
they started to fall on their faces and
cried, Adonai, who Elohim, the Lord, he is
God, the Lord, he is God, God had
returned to Israel, because one man took a
stand against the idolatry in his nation, oh,
brothers and sisters, you don't want to be
like Ahab, not in these days, we need
the Elijah legacy, the spirit and power of
Elijah turns the hearts of the fathers to
the children, the hearts of the children to
the fathers, the earth is cursed because we
have so many fatherless children all over the
world, John the Baptist came in the spirit
and power of Elijah, and Jesus said, he
who is least in the kingdom of God
is greater than John the Baptist, brothers and
sisters, Elijah is coming and he will restore
all things, Jesus said, we need an Elijah
army of men and women who are consecrated,
committed in communion with the Lord, who have
courage, who have compassion for the lost, oh,
may it be here in Israel, and may
it be in your nation.
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